In the construction industry, immigrant workers also take a range of jobs, including as laborers, cement masons and equipment operators, said Tony Milo, executive director of the Colorado Contractors Association, whose members build roads and bridges throughout the state.

The construction industry has been hammered by the economic recession, losing thousands of jobs. But as the economy rebounds, immigrants will be needed to fill jobs, Milo said.

“We’re going to get to a point where we don’t have enough people,” Milo said. “I’m hearing from a number of my members that they’re starting to run into a problem finding qualified labor. A lot of people have left our industry and gone to other places to find employment.”

And the work seasonal immigrant employees do in the field often supports year-round jobs in the office, Fefes said.

“If a company can get the work, they need more full-time people to schedule the trucks,” Fefes said.

Fefes and Milo said their members believe changes to immigration laws should cover several points, including strengthening national security, allowing flexibility in terms of the number of people coming to the United States to work, and having an employment-verification system that’s quick, efficient and accurate.

And they said their members also want a path to legalization for undocumented workers now in the country.

The reforms also need to address future labor needs for low-skilled and high-skilled workers, Fefes said.

The current H2B visa program is capped at 66,000 visas nationwide, Fefes said.

“That’s an arbitrary cap that hasn’t changed since 1986 and it’s not nearly enough,” Fefes said. “If it’s market-based, then as the economy ebbs and flows and the jobs ebb and flow, then the numbers can go up when we need them to and go down when we don’t.”

Milo said the construction industry also is fighting a proposal that would cap the number of seasonal laborers in construction at one-quarter of 1 percent of current construction employment levels, or about 14,500 visas.

“As these talks move forward, the construction industry needs to be treated just like any other industry,” Milo said. “Our members are committed to hire legal workers.”

While some argue that companies could find local, non-immigrant workers if they raised wages high enough, Fefes and Milo said wages aren’t the issue.

Mike Leman, president and CEO of Singing Hills Landscape Inc. in Aurora, said his company routinely advertises — without success — for local workers every season.

“We typically have less than five local applications a year, and in many years, those people don’t even show up for an interview,” Leman said.

The company’s seasonal wages average $13 an hour plus benefits, he said.

So instead, Singing Hills has turned to the H2B visa program,­ with many of the same people traveling from Mexico to work summer after summer for the company, Leman said.

“Some of them have five years’, some of them have 13 years’, experience working for our company,” Leman said, who hopes Congress will continue to allow the same workers to travel to America every year.

“They are part of our family. I know these guys, I know their families, I know their kids — some of those kids have gone to college in Mexico because their fathers worked for us,” Leman said.